Speaker 1: I had to start for giving myself before I could
Speaker 1: even go to anything else. And it happened when I
Speaker 1: went to prison. Welcome to the one you feed Throughout time,
Speaker 1: great thinkers have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have.
Speaker 1: Quotes like garbage in, garbage out, or you are what
Speaker 1: you think ring true, and yet for many of us,
Speaker 1: our thoughts don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity,
Speaker 1: self pity, jealousy, or fear. We see what we don't
Speaker 1: have instead of what we do. We think things that
Speaker 1: hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not
Speaker 1: just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent,
Speaker 1: and creative effort to make a life worth living. This
Speaker 1: podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in
Speaker 1: the right direction, how they feed their good wolf. Yeah,
Speaker 1: thanks for joining us. Our guest on this episode is
Speaker 1: Donna Hilton, a women's rights activist and criminal justice reform advocate.
Speaker 1: Donna is a sought after speaker who speaks publicly about
Speaker 1: the trauma of sexual violence and abuse. She emphasizes how
Speaker 1: the root causes often result in victimization, and that of
Speaker 1: women who have been abused are being incarcerated, especially women
Speaker 1: of color. Her book is a Little Piece of Light,
Speaker 1: a memoir of hope, prison and a life abound. Hi, Donna,
Speaker 1: welcome to the show. Hi, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: It is a real honor to have you on. You
Speaker 1: have an incredible story in an incredible journey, and a
Speaker 1: wonderful book called A Little Piece of Light, a memoir
Speaker 1: of hope, prison and a life unbound. And we're going
Speaker 1: to get into all of that in a moment, but
Speaker 1: let's start like we always do, with the parable. There
Speaker 1: is a grandmother who's talking with her granddaughter and she says,
Speaker 1: in life, there are two wolves inside of us that
Speaker 1: are always at battle. One is a good wolf, which
Speaker 1: represents things like kindness and bravery and love, and the
Speaker 1: other is a bad wolf, which represents things like greed
Speaker 1: and hatred and fear. And the granddutter stops and thinks
Speaker 1: about it for a second and looks up at our
Speaker 1: grandmother says, well, grandmother, which one wins? And the grandmother says,
Speaker 1: the one you feed. So I'd like to start off
Speaker 1: by asking you what that parable means to you in
Speaker 1: your life and in the work that you do, so
Speaker 1: that parable actually asonates with me a lot. And I
Speaker 1: say that because I looking at my entire life, my childhood,
Speaker 1: you know, all the things that I went through, the abuse,
Speaker 1: the trauma, the violence. I could have become a product
Speaker 1: of all those things at any time, and I didn't
Speaker 1: because I knew there was something more that that wasn't me,
Speaker 1: wasn't who I should be, and I didn't. I don't
Speaker 1: know what was keeping me, So I would say grounded
Speaker 1: or knowing for a little girl, but I kind of knew,
Speaker 1: but I just didn't know how to navigate. I didn't
Speaker 1: know how to articulate. I just didn't know what to
Speaker 1: do because I was a child. Um. But I continue
Speaker 1: to hold onto the light, which is the good wolf, right,
Speaker 1: because I knew that that other stuff that was happening
Speaker 1: around me wasn't me, but I just didn't know how
Speaker 1: to get out of it. Yeah, And it's just something
Speaker 1: that I knew was just in age. I think, you know,
Speaker 1: I try to like figure that out, and I just knew,
Speaker 1: I really did, and because it felt right, It felt
Speaker 1: right as a as a little girl. It just felt
Speaker 1: right to know, like knowing the things that were going
Speaker 1: on around me were bad, but I just didn't know
Speaker 1: how bad and really know what to do with it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a great perspective and I love you know, sort
Speaker 1: of equating the good wolf with that little piece of light,
Speaker 1: which is a theme that runs through your book that
Speaker 1: despite all the darkness you you held onto these little
Speaker 1: points of light. So maybe let's start with just having
Speaker 1: you walk us through some of the darkness that got
Speaker 1: you to where you ended up. I don't want to
Speaker 1: say too much. It would be nice people get the book.
Speaker 1: But I was born on the island of Jamaica, and
Speaker 1: I was born to a mother that looking back now
Speaker 1: and my adulthood and understanding, I know she had some
Speaker 1: mental illness. My diagnosis right now, I would say she
Speaker 1: was bipolar, man oppressive. I could be wrong, but I
Speaker 1: think I'm kind of glow still and being on point,
Speaker 1: especially understanding human behavior and human condition. Um. And so
Speaker 1: she was. But she was my mother. She was abusive,
Speaker 1: but then she'd be loving, and then she'd be abusive
Speaker 1: right after she's loving. It was really difficult for me
Speaker 1: as a child to you know, understand what was wrong
Speaker 1: with my mother and and understand why she wasn't around
Speaker 1: as much. And when she was around, why would she always,
Speaker 1: you know, go from one way to another way good,
Speaker 1: too bad, be loving, and then not loving, be really cruel. Um.
Speaker 1: But she was my mother and I still loved her,
Speaker 1: and so by the time I was around UM six,
Speaker 1: six and a half six, couple was introduced to me,
Speaker 1: and I eventually was brought to America. When I found
Speaker 1: out later much later, actually when I was writing the
Speaker 1: book and putting the pieces together, then I was sold
Speaker 1: and I was brought up to America with the couple,
Speaker 1: and I was told that they were now my mother
Speaker 1: and my father. And I was hard for me to
Speaker 1: really understand because I knew my mother, I knew other
Speaker 1: people in my family in Jamaica. UM. I was seven
Speaker 1: and a half when I got here, and so by
Speaker 1: the time I was nine and a half, so it's
Speaker 1: about two years, the man who was now my father
Speaker 1: started taking me to a closet and raped me almost
Speaker 1: every day. And I was like nine and a half.
Speaker 1: So I went from one series of um or horrific
Speaker 1: conditions to another. I actually would have preferred being home
Speaker 1: with my mother because she was my mother and I
Speaker 1: knew her, you know, and she gave birth to me,
Speaker 1: So I mean, I grew up in a country that
Speaker 1: I know, I remember it well, and being here in
Speaker 1: this country and not always asking for my mother, when
Speaker 1: will I see her again? You know, it's just on
Speaker 1: top of the abuse, the trauma, the rapes and the
Speaker 1: molestations and stuff. You know, it was just really difficult,
Speaker 1: really difficult. It was very traumatic, you know. And your
Speaker 1: your adoptive mother was not um a stroll in the
Speaker 1: park either. She wasn't you know. When I came here.
Speaker 1: She was a psychiatric social worker, but she was working
Speaker 1: towards her other degrees. So at some point, and I'm
Speaker 1: not sure when she was in a duel or some
Speaker 1: kind of master's program where she got her master's and
Speaker 1: PhD and all these things, and she went on to
Speaker 1: becoming one of New York State's mental health directors. And
Speaker 1: she used to take me with her to some of
Speaker 1: her places where she had her patients. They called them
Speaker 1: patients then, And UM, I knew that they were different.
Speaker 1: I knew, I understood. I understood clearly that they were
Speaker 1: mentally challenged or some things were wrong. Didn't really get it,
Speaker 1: but I understood something with different. Um, but I watched
Speaker 1: how she treated them, and she treated them very nicely, hearingly,
Speaker 1: and all I wanted her to do was just giving
Speaker 1: me a key so I could lock my bedroom door,
Speaker 1: so I wouldn't be hurt anymore, you know. Um, And
Speaker 1: I didn't understand how she didn't I didn't understand why
Speaker 1: she couldn't help me. But then I also was told that, well,
Speaker 1: I believed everything that was happening was my fault. As
Speaker 1: a child, you believe everything bad that happens is your fault,
Speaker 1: and so you start owning other people's stuff. You don't
Speaker 1: know how to, you know, rationalize and and and and
Speaker 1: analyze what's going on around you. It was just very painful.
Speaker 1: One of the themes of the book to me is
Speaker 1: all the different systems that failed you, And one of
Speaker 1: the early ones was you finally got up the courage
Speaker 1: to tell a school counselor what your adoptive father was
Speaker 1: doing to you. I was about twelve twelve and a half,
Speaker 1: and um, I was on the track team by then,
Speaker 1: I was the captain of the track team, and so
Speaker 1: I was finding a sense of freedom in running track.
Speaker 1: I think that's probably why I became good at it,
Speaker 1: because I was running away right in my mind as
Speaker 1: I ran but one day, I just I was tired.
Speaker 1: I just tired. I just was so tired, and so
Speaker 1: I went to tell the counselor that I needed some help.
Speaker 1: And I tried to tell her. I told her basically,
Speaker 1: my father was hurting me and I couldn't take it anymore.
Speaker 1: And she asked me, does my mother no And I
Speaker 1: said no. As a child, I said no, I'm looking
Speaker 1: back though I knew. Now I now know she knew.
Speaker 1: But so she said she would call her. That's okay.
Speaker 1: All I really wanted out of that to happen was
Speaker 1: for her to give me a key, say she would
Speaker 1: give me a key from my bedroom door. And so
Speaker 1: that was my childish way of saying that would be
Speaker 1: my help. But that didn't happen. I don't really know
Speaker 1: the conversation on the phone, but I just know that
Speaker 1: the counselor passed me the phone that your mother wants
Speaker 1: to speak with you. The next thing I know, she
Speaker 1: was yelling at me and called me a liar and
Speaker 1: threatened me. There was a show that I used to
Speaker 1: watch that scared me after death as a kid, and
Speaker 1: um she told me that I would become just like
Speaker 1: the people that I would see the women that were
Speaker 1: on that show, and I would be locked up and
Speaker 1: I would never be able to come out and wouldn't
Speaker 1: be home. I mean all kinds of things, and it
Speaker 1: just shut me down. But she told basically told them
Speaker 1: that I was lying, told the councilor I was lying,
Speaker 1: and so I shut up from there. And so then
Speaker 1: not too long after that, you are in a position where, uh,
Speaker 1: there is an older male that comes into your life
Speaker 1: who pretends to want to help you. The story is
Speaker 1: just it's just reading it. It's just I know, people
Speaker 1: tell me what people say. I have the comments like, oh,
Speaker 1: that could possibly have happened. Everybody couldn't have done that. Sort, yes,
Speaker 1: it does happen. I'm not the only star you're You're not.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately you're not. No, I'm not. I'm just speaking about
Speaker 1: it and bringing it and making you uncomfortable with it
Speaker 1: by bringing it to the surface because we have to
Speaker 1: talk about it. We have to do that so we
Speaker 1: can stop this and get to the root causes and stuff.
Speaker 1: But you're right, So an older person did come into
Speaker 1: my life. Why because I found out, well, look at
Speaker 1: understanding it now, my father was involved with immigrants. I
Speaker 1: don't even know what you call that, getting people to
Speaker 1: get citizenships by marrying them to people that were American citizens.
Speaker 1: While he was doing that, and so there was one
Speaker 1: older gentleman who's definitely older than me. I was fourteen
Speaker 1: by at that time. He was like twenty, and he
Speaker 1: just started talking to me, asked me, how are you,
Speaker 1: you know, just being nice and I would talk to him,
Speaker 1: and one day he said, you know, you can talk
Speaker 1: to me. You can tell me anything that you want.
Speaker 1: I care you know, I care about you basically. And
Speaker 1: so this just two years later, and he felt he
Speaker 1: sounded since here to me, you know, So I said, okay,
Speaker 1: I would tell him, and I started telling him what
Speaker 1: was going on. I think over a course of like
Speaker 1: two days or so, two or three days. I didn't
Speaker 1: tell him all at one time. And by the end
Speaker 1: of the conversations, uh, he told me that he would
Speaker 1: help me. He would take me away, get me away
Speaker 1: from there, and no one would hurt me again. You
Speaker 1: would make sure that I was okay. That's all I
Speaker 1: wanted to hear. That's all I needed. You know, I
Speaker 1: couldn't get the key. I still hadn't gotten a key
Speaker 1: to the house to get inside. Get out or in
Speaker 1: or to my bedroom. So I was like, okay, maybe
Speaker 1: this will work. You know, I just needed help. I
Speaker 1: mean it was an adult, so I figured, okay I
Speaker 1: would get help. Became my worst nightmare, and it just
Speaker 1: you know, one thing I'd like to tell people that people,
Speaker 1: especially girls who are facing or dealing with trauma, trauma
Speaker 1: such as that, in that capacity, um, it does something
Speaker 1: different to us, our psyche. We're already made to believe
Speaker 1: that we are second before men, before boys, right, and
Speaker 1: so we're less valued. You kind of know that in
Speaker 1: your own way as a kid, you kind of know that,
Speaker 1: and so and people, the adults reinforced that around you, right,
Speaker 1: and especially for me, And so I believe he was
Speaker 1: a man. I believe you would help you know that
Speaker 1: kind of thing. But I also had an older man
Speaker 1: that was abusing me, already raping me, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, So it kind of made sense that, well,
Speaker 1: a man can help me in this situation. Two weeks
Speaker 1: after um um, I ran away with him because he
Speaker 1: talked me to running away, he started abusing me and
Speaker 1: raping me even worse than I could imagine, and became
Speaker 1: the father of your child. So I mean I say
Speaker 1: clearly that Adrian is a product of rape. I was
Speaker 1: fifteen years old. I didn't want to have sex with her.
Speaker 1: I didn't. That's not what I ran away for. I
Speaker 1: ran away to get to be safe, to be protected.
Speaker 1: But that's not what that turned into. And yeah, I
Speaker 1: got pregnant with Agent and she's a product of that.
Speaker 1: But I love her, you know, UM, I know what
Speaker 1: it's like not to be loved and to be hurt.
Speaker 1: So I could never do that to her or any
Speaker 1: other human being. UM, But it's difficult. Sometimes it's difficult.
Speaker 1: How is she? Are you comfortable talking about that? I'm okay.
Speaker 1: I wrote it in a book to Adrian. You know,
Speaker 1: I was hurt herself. Family member heard her. Um. She
Speaker 1: ran away the same age as I did, and ran
Speaker 1: to me in prison, and I helped her as much
Speaker 1: as I could. I eventually signed her into the army.
Speaker 1: That's what she wanted to do. UM, But she was
Speaker 1: still kind of messed up. Why because her mother wasn't there.
Speaker 1: And it does have an effect on your children when
Speaker 1: the mother is in there, A family you know is
Speaker 1: in there, definitely the mother and she carries that to
Speaker 1: this day. So our relationship is a work in progress.
Speaker 1: She started um doing drugs, heroin and really badly, and
Speaker 1: I've been trying to deal with that, doing the best
Speaker 1: that I can with that. She's an adult now, so
Speaker 1: it's not much that I can do. She says she's off.
Speaker 1: I would like to believe her, you know, Um, I
Speaker 1: would like to believe her. I'm here, but I have
Speaker 1: to keep a healthy distance also because Adrian likes to
Speaker 1: continue to throw in my face that I wasn't there
Speaker 1: and blame me not be not being there when she
Speaker 1: was younger to the things that happened to her. And
Speaker 1: after a while, you gotta have to like grow up
Speaker 1: and you know, And I've tried to do everything that
Speaker 1: I can. But I'm still there as best as I can.
Speaker 1: I'll always be there for her, always love her. But
Speaker 1: it's a work in progress. Well, I sincerely hope and
Speaker 1: wish for the best for her. So without belaboring too
Speaker 1: much of it, I want to get on with with
Speaker 1: parts of the story. But the abuse doesn't stop there.
Speaker 1: By the time that you um, you know, you you
Speaker 1: referenced at prison. We'll talk about that in a minute.
Speaker 1: By the time you've gone into prison, you have been
Speaker 1: abused and raped by your math teacher, a police officer,
Speaker 1: a clergyman. I mean, you have been damaged over and
Speaker 1: over again. You know. I get these questions like how
Speaker 1: can you talk about it and just talk about it?
Speaker 1: And I said, it comes with practice. It comes to practice,
Speaker 1: It comes with many, many years of therapy healing. But
Speaker 1: it also comes from that place of light. So it
Speaker 1: comes from that good wolf that I feed because I
Speaker 1: know that to talk about it, I released it as well.
Speaker 1: Instead of holding on. And as much as you talk
Speaker 1: about and you think you released all the pain and
Speaker 1: the stuff that you go through. Their echoes, right, and
Speaker 1: so your body and your mind and your you have
Speaker 1: echoes of trauma. You have echoes of things that happened
Speaker 1: to you. And so you know, I tell people that
Speaker 1: I talk about it because I know I need to
Speaker 1: tell people what happens and what we do to people
Speaker 1: so we can face it and understand it and try
Speaker 1: to stop it. Mind you, everything that happened in the
Speaker 1: book up until I went to prison how been to
Speaker 1: me by the time when I was nineteen twenty. It's
Speaker 1: not like I lived and this was like my life.
Speaker 1: This is something that since my childhood. You know, the
Speaker 1: one with the police officer. An older man was trying
Speaker 1: to make me be his girl girlfriend or something like that,
Speaker 1: and I just kept my distance. And this he found
Speaker 1: where I was staying in the bronx and was waiting
Speaker 1: outside in the night. And I had just happened to
Speaker 1: go outside with a friend to go to the store,
Speaker 1: and he was waiting. He knew where I was and
Speaker 1: he was waiting, and he snatched me up by gunpoint,
Speaker 1: took me into a cab, took me to his home,
Speaker 1: and he raped me, kept me there for three days,
Speaker 1: and a friend of a neighbor, a family neighborhood friend
Speaker 1: who just happened to be a person of the church
Speaker 1: or a local pastor, invited him a I don't know
Speaker 1: how that happened. I just know he was there, I
Speaker 1: knew who he was, and he raped me as well.
Speaker 1: So those things do happen. It was from that incident
Speaker 1: where I was able to get away after three days
Speaker 1: and I went back and she told I told what happened,
Speaker 1: and she told me she knew he had snatched me
Speaker 1: because she was there when he took me by gunpoint,
Speaker 1: and she said, need to go to the police and
Speaker 1: say something. I was afraid too, but I did it.
Speaker 1: You know, I did it. I went. I had burns
Speaker 1: on my body because he had burned me. It beat
Speaker 1: me really bad. The detective who took the case took
Speaker 1: me to Jacoby Housewell was a burned unit there. I
Speaker 1: was treated and he was taking me back. He pulled
Speaker 1: me over on the street, Dark Street, Court Street, in
Speaker 1: a bronx and he raped me. So it does happen,
Speaker 1: and yes, so you know, I was saying referencing before that.
Speaker 1: You know, when you're young, you you you, and especially
Speaker 1: for young girls, you really start owning and really believing
Speaker 1: that everything that happens around you as your fault. And
Speaker 1: so you continue to make those series of same mistakes
Speaker 1: because you don't know how to navigate, You don't know
Speaker 1: how to rationalize what's going on, and there's no positive
Speaker 1: or the good wolves around you just like, hey, I
Speaker 1: need help, and they really help you. Predators no prey.
Speaker 1: And when predators recognize prey, they victimized, they hurt, they
Speaker 1: do these things and they're I mean, there are a
Speaker 1: lot of broken people in this world. There are a
Speaker 1: lot of broken people in this world. And I said,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of walking wounded people, and I've turned
Speaker 1: my life into becoming a wounded healer as opposed to
Speaker 1: hurting people. So you go to prison, Um, maybe we
Speaker 1: spend a minute or two on what brought you there,
Speaker 1: although I think that's less important to the overall story,
Speaker 1: but maybe you know, walk us through that and then
Speaker 1: you know, then I'd like to talk about your time
Speaker 1: in prison, because that's really when things started to really
Speaker 1: change for you. Being young and trying not going back
Speaker 1: to the Hilton's after I run away and I got
Speaker 1: away from Adrian's father, I was trying to figure out
Speaker 1: life and trying to figure out what I was gonna
Speaker 1: do as a young mother. I was a child with
Speaker 1: a child that would get odd jobs and trying to
Speaker 1: become a model because I thought if I was a
Speaker 1: model that that would help me. I don't know why.
Speaker 1: It was my childish dream. I was like, Oh, they
Speaker 1: can be they're pretty and no one hurts them. I
Speaker 1: really believe that people always thought about how pretty I am,
Speaker 1: so I equated that were like, they're pretty, no one
Speaker 1: hurts them. I want to do that. I want to
Speaker 1: be like them. Anyway, it was me working and trying
Speaker 1: to do that build up model, modeling career. At sixteen seventeen,
Speaker 1: eighteen nineteen, I started working at this hotel gift shop
Speaker 1: and I met my son to be co defended. And
Speaker 1: I was gullible and just nice, and I just everybody
Speaker 1: I wanted to be my friend on the walk and wounded.
Speaker 1: I needed family and needed friendship. I needed at all,
Speaker 1: a very needy because I was so broken, and she
Speaker 1: just seemed very nice and not like everybody else. She
Speaker 1: was that you know, people shy away from people because
Speaker 1: they don't look like everyone else. And she looked frumpy
Speaker 1: and you know whatever. And I was like, oh, she's
Speaker 1: my friend, you know, like I was going to protect
Speaker 1: her like I couldn't protect me. And I felt I
Speaker 1: was becoming her friend. And it was after a series
Speaker 1: of conversations with me telling her everything. I just told
Speaker 1: her everything, did you do that? And telling her what
Speaker 1: I wanted to do be a model and about my daughter,
Speaker 1: and I just, you know, I don't know what to do.
Speaker 1: I have her staying with the people that hurt me, right,
Speaker 1: my my mother and my father, but I don't know,
Speaker 1: I don't have a place. I was eighteen nineteen and um,
Speaker 1: so she told me one day that Oh, I can
Speaker 1: get my godfather to help you. He knows people, he
Speaker 1: knows everyone didn't. She started talking about being um in
Speaker 1: the mafia, and UH said okay. I didn't say okay,
Speaker 1: it didn't matter. I was like her, heard help, no problem, Fine,
Speaker 1: that didn't go well. Um he said basically, I'm a
Speaker 1: kind of speed it up so he won't spend so
Speaker 1: much time on it. But it's important. It's very important
Speaker 1: because of Mr v Um that he would help me. Oh,
Speaker 1: he just wants me to um do something for him.
Speaker 1: I was like sure. So the bottom line was, would I,
Speaker 1: you know, say I witnessed a sexual encounter between his
Speaker 1: business partner and Maria, who became my co defended and
Speaker 1: they both game my defended and so I said, okay,
Speaker 1: that's where I read wrong, as you never have said okay,
Speaker 1: because it's nothing okay with that. But I didn't see
Speaker 1: it that way because sex at this time, that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff didn't. It didn't matter to me because people
Speaker 1: were that's what they were doing to me. So at
Speaker 1: there was no judgment call, there was no rationale for
Speaker 1: me there. The day came for for me to do
Speaker 1: that be you know, walking on a sexual you know,
Speaker 1: intimate scene with um Mr V, who I didn't know,
Speaker 1: but no later on was mr V and Maria and
Speaker 1: I walked into a kidnap. Kidnapping was already in place
Speaker 1: and I couldn't walk out of it. And because of that,
Speaker 1: I became a co defendant and an accessory. That was
Speaker 1: not my crime or anything that I put together. But
Speaker 1: you would not know that based on media, you know,
Speaker 1: and on what other people have to say, UM, but
Speaker 1: it was actually known in the court that you know,
Speaker 1: I and a couple of the other girls were accessories
Speaker 1: to list thing. We didn't have any clue. We didn't
Speaker 1: even know who Mr V was. We had no We
Speaker 1: weren't into these things. We were young and I was
Speaker 1: the youngest. So I received life and I went to Bedford.
Speaker 1: But the crimes of kidnapping and murder, because that's what
Speaker 1: the convictions were for. I didn't kidnap mr V and
Speaker 1: I didn't murder mr V. Actually Mr V wasn't murdered
Speaker 1: in the sense when we see someone killing someone UM,
Speaker 1: but he was murdered because it was in an act
Speaker 1: of a felony where he had he was kidnapped and
Speaker 1: so he had a gag over his eyes and his
Speaker 1: mouth and he suffocated because I think he was trying
Speaker 1: to move it or no one suffocated him. And they
Speaker 1: said that the autopsic shows that. So it was like
Speaker 1: a slow kind of progression, um, which is horrible, And
Speaker 1: how could a person die? You know? And I'm around
Speaker 1: like how could I not do anything? Like? How could
Speaker 1: this happen? But I I blame myself for a very
Speaker 1: long time, a very long time, and so that's where
Speaker 1: I had to start with the healing. I had to
Speaker 1: start for giving myself before I could even go anything else.
Speaker 1: And it happened when I went to prison. You say
Speaker 1: in the book, the people that involved you in this crime,
Speaker 1: you know, had threatened to your family if you did
Speaker 1: not help and participate. And I didn't want anybody dead.
Speaker 1: I didn't. I didn't like what does that mean? And
Speaker 1: they were saying they were mafia related, and there I
Speaker 1: believed them. Adults stay doing all these things around me.
Speaker 1: I don't know what that means. I don't know, um,
Speaker 1: but I couldn't as what I said. When I walked
Speaker 1: into a kid and I couldn't walk out. Everything just
Speaker 1: turned upside down. It was just I had no I
Speaker 1: just did not know what to do. So let's move
Speaker 1: on to prison, because in prison, ironically, you know, it's
Speaker 1: a it's kind of a sad testament to a lot
Speaker 1: of things. That prison became, uh the safest place for
Speaker 1: you in some awful ways. Um, although not entirely, but
Speaker 1: you know, but but that you started to really heal there.
Speaker 1: And you know, for me, there seemed to be a
Speaker 1: real turning point in the book when you got involved
Speaker 1: with helping a woman named Helen. So why don't you
Speaker 1: tell us about that? So as so some years later,
Speaker 1: and I was living on a unit with this woman
Speaker 1: named Helen, and we used to you know, on units,
Speaker 1: women are very maternal and nurturing, and so we cook
Speaker 1: and you know, eat together, or do things together, wash,
Speaker 1: you know, wash our clothes together, stuff like that. And
Speaker 1: I started doing that with her, just gravitated towards her.
Speaker 1: She was very quiet to herself, but I like she
Speaker 1: other people don't gravitate to our gravitate too. That's just
Speaker 1: who I am, are you? So one day I didn't
Speaker 1: see her, like where is Helen? And so I went
Speaker 1: to the office and I was like, because I didn't
Speaker 1: her door seemed to be closed. I didn't look into
Speaker 1: her the little tiny window her door, and so I
Speaker 1: went to the the officer, and the officer said he
Speaker 1: didn't know where she was. He thinks she's in her room.
Speaker 1: I was like, but it's so late in the day,
Speaker 1: like she's usually out there. Just you know, behavior wasn't right.
Speaker 1: So I was walking to her or a an older
Speaker 1: woman on the unit said don't go in there. I
Speaker 1: already knew she had the virus. And by the virus,
Speaker 1: you mean early days of the AIDS crisis. I was like, what,
Speaker 1: why wouldn't I go to her, you know, check on
Speaker 1: her at her door. I went, she was in there,
Speaker 1: but she was in there. She looked like she was dying.
Speaker 1: And I just streaked out. I was like, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: you know, because I got to care for her like
Speaker 1: a sister. And when I went in. I went in,
Speaker 1: I felt and she felt very very hot. She was
Speaker 1: like she looked her mouth was very dry, she just
Speaker 1: her skin was ash. She just not didn't look right.
Speaker 1: And I got scared, like, oh my god, is she dined.
Speaker 1: I can't have another person die, I mean, not helling
Speaker 1: like you know, it just couldn't happen again. So I
Speaker 1: got the rag. I put it on her head. I
Speaker 1: was trying to put water in her mouth to like
Speaker 1: just give her something so you know, she wouldn't be
Speaker 1: so dry. And I was screaming for the officer and
Speaker 1: get and people are yelling at me, Oh, you need
Speaker 1: to get on. She's sick, she's you're gonna die, you know,
Speaker 1: the stigma that happened. Then when I didn't here, the
Speaker 1: officer wasn't moving fast enough for me. I picked her up.
Speaker 1: I picked her up, and I took her out and
Speaker 1: I was taking her to the hospital, which just happened
Speaker 1: to not be far. But I just could not see
Speaker 1: another person dying. And I didn't like how people were
Speaker 1: treating because we were you know, people are afraid stigma.
Speaker 1: You know, you thought that just breathing the same air
Speaker 1: as a person I had to virus, you would get sick.
Speaker 1: And it didn't matter to me, you know, it just
Speaker 1: didn't matter to me, and I just needed her to
Speaker 1: get some help. And it just started from there. It
Speaker 1: was my that moment where I was like, I cannot
Speaker 1: see another person be hurt and I don't do something.
Speaker 1: If I'm able to do something about it, yeah, and
Speaker 1: then you know, Unfortunately Helen died, But you said in
Speaker 1: the book, Um, you know, when Helen died, I said farewell,
Speaker 1: not only to her but also to who I was
Speaker 1: before I knew her. I no longer need to stand by,
Speaker 1: to stay silent when something bad happens to me or
Speaker 1: another woman. From this point, I'm my own person, focus
Speaker 1: and holy on my goodness and my growth. Yeah. No,
Speaker 1: it's a it's clearly a poignant moment for you. And
Speaker 1: I did I. Um, I said goodbye to the little girl,
Speaker 1: that little girl who was silent, but I embraced the
Speaker 1: little girl who found her voice, and I started telling
Speaker 1: her I love her. I started holding her and just
Speaker 1: letting her know that she didn't have to be silent.
Speaker 1: That is gonna be okay, We're gonna figure it out together.
Speaker 1: I always had to talk to the little girl in
Speaker 1: me because nobody else did. And then I just started
Speaker 1: just doing that more. And I just started just not
Speaker 1: so much changing, because I don't believe we change. I
Speaker 1: believe we become who we truly are, given the circumstances
Speaker 1: and opportunity, and as ab normal and as dismal and
Speaker 1: as crazy as a as prison is, because there's no
Speaker 1: such thing as a humane, healthy There isn't. But there
Speaker 1: was the need in me. The want in me was
Speaker 1: so strong that I fed that. I fed that. So
Speaker 1: you and and some of these women go on to
Speaker 1: start the AIDS Counseling and Education program, which was the
Speaker 1: first of its kind, right in anywhere in the world.
Speaker 1: In a prison, and you begin a response to HIV.
Speaker 1: And as we'd figured it out and said we need
Speaker 1: to do something, we didn't turn our backs to this.
Speaker 1: You began to take care of women in prison, and
Speaker 1: you're healing continues to grow. Yes, and um, I was
Speaker 1: adamant that we needed a hospice kind of unit because
Speaker 1: too many women were dying and they needed a place
Speaker 1: to convalesce or we needed that space. And finally the warden,
Speaker 1: the superintendent was able to make that happen. And it
Speaker 1: wasn't just me, was the women. But I was really
Speaker 1: like adamant about that, Like we had this small little
Speaker 1: space that the women were in and it just wasn't right.
Speaker 1: We needed a unit like a hospice unit, and we
Speaker 1: were able to get that and we just build it out.
Speaker 1: I helped build it out from there and was taking
Speaker 1: care of the women from that moment on. I was
Speaker 1: always a part of the medical program and and all
Speaker 1: these other programs. And one of the things that I think,
Speaker 1: what what happened in my time an hour two people
Speaker 1: I write about our time there. We had We were
Speaker 1: fortunate enough to have a warden, a superintendent what we
Speaker 1: call here in New York, that understood you have to
Speaker 1: ask the women what they need so they can tell
Speaker 1: you what they need. We can't tell you what they need.
Speaker 1: They can tell you they know what they need. Give
Speaker 1: us that. She helped build our voices and allowed us
Speaker 1: UM to have some kind of autonomy over our surroundings.
Speaker 1: And that's how we were able to create the first
Speaker 1: HIV AIDS program in the prison has modeled all across
Speaker 1: the world. We brought college back, We created a children's
Speaker 1: program that's the first of its kind in prison UM,
Speaker 1: a family violence program that uh the came out of
Speaker 1: the Governor's office after they were serious of hearings that
Speaker 1: happened and say why most women do go for being
Speaker 1: battered and and abused and hurt, and some do kill
Speaker 1: their batterers. And it does happen because after a while,
Speaker 1: sometimes you just snap or whatever, you just are the opportunity,
Speaker 1: and it's not like you know, these women are happy
Speaker 1: about what they did or like you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: they've blacked out there, Like I mean, the trauma is amazing.
Speaker 1: Like for me, I can't even some things as heeled
Speaker 1: as I am, it's also still as broken as I
Speaker 1: am that I can't even put certain times together like
Speaker 1: what time was this? What like year or what? You know,
Speaker 1: Like it's kind of confusing, especially as a child, like
Speaker 1: the blackout things like where kind of having pictures of
Speaker 1: things like what was that? Like a remembrance of something,
Speaker 1: because your mind goes into that place where it protects us.
Speaker 1: We were created with these mechanisms where our bodies would
Speaker 1: protect That's why search like horrible crimes and people have
Speaker 1: car crashes. After a while, the endorphins in your body
Speaker 1: are released, so you don't feel the pain as much,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean, there's things that happened that we
Speaker 1: it's just innate and and I try to get people
Speaker 1: to understand we're not the worst moment in our lives.
Speaker 1: We're not the our mistakes were not, their crimes were
Speaker 1: not those. We're human beings that have been through something.
Speaker 1: And even for people that do really do bad things.
Speaker 1: Why do they do it? Most people just don't wake
Speaker 1: up and say, oh, I'm gonna go out here and
Speaker 1: I'm gonna murder and I'm just gonna whatever. People, it's
Speaker 1: not we just had a shooting here. I mean not here,
Speaker 1: but in country yesterday. It was yesterday before yesterday. Guy
Speaker 1: just shot up his coworkers. They're like, what happened? Right?
Speaker 1: Something off? And no, we're not going to catch everything,
Speaker 1: but there are signs of things and people need to
Speaker 1: pay attention and are at least acknowledge it when they
Speaker 1: see it, because it's there, it happens. Don't act like
Speaker 1: it doesn't exist when we see something. After nine eleven,
Speaker 1: the country is like, if you see something, say something.
Speaker 1: If you're seeing a child getting hurt, say something. If
Speaker 1: you see anyone getting hurt, say something. You know what
Speaker 1: I mean? Like, we need to get back our humanity
Speaker 1: and we would be able to do that in Bedford
Speaker 1: at that time. Yeah, hurt people, hurt people. It's the reality.
Speaker 1: And and so you were part of what you guys
Speaker 1: did there was you worked on. I think tell me
Speaker 1: if I get this right that you worked on at
Speaker 1: least allowing women backgrounds what had happened to them be
Speaker 1: part of what was admissible in court and considered in
Speaker 1: their sentencing. Yeah, so that was the bill you're talking about,
Speaker 1: the d v s j A. Yes, we got it
Speaker 1: into law. Oh did he signed it last? Are we
Speaker 1: last month? Yeah? Yeah, so he signed it last month
Speaker 1: and we were celebrating, celebrating now a little bit. So, yes,
Speaker 1: the Domestic Violence Survivors Justice Act. Well, it's not just women,
Speaker 1: it's also we didn't leave men out because it happens
Speaker 1: to ment to men or abuse where they can at
Speaker 1: least if they can show that they had significant amount
Speaker 1: of trauma and abuse in their lives that led them,
Speaker 1: you know, that led them to either participate in the
Speaker 1: crime or the crime happened because of such abuse, then
Speaker 1: they're able to get their sentences at either an alternative
Speaker 1: program depending on the severity or intervention. Right M. Definitely
Speaker 1: not as much time because people need help with like,
Speaker 1: abuse to that extent does have an effect on people,
Speaker 1: and people react, people snap people. We're human beings. And again,
Speaker 1: no one's saying that it's okay, No one's saying it's right.
Speaker 1: We absolutely know at least those look that I know
Speaker 1: that I did time with and continue to be friends with.
Speaker 1: We know and we're not okay with it. But that's
Speaker 1: why I do the work that I do, because I
Speaker 1: need the world to understand we cannot keep doing this
Speaker 1: and people don't. We shouldn't have people coming, I mean
Speaker 1: even getting to a place where they just snap. They
Speaker 1: don't even know what they're doing. They just know they
Speaker 1: have to survive. And I tell people if you're hungry,
Speaker 1: if you are hungry, I mean starving your your body
Speaker 1: saying eat and it doesn't care how you feed it.
Speaker 1: You have to eat. And so when you see people
Speaker 1: stealing because they need to eat because they're hungry, if
Speaker 1: you're hungry, you're gonna do the same thing. If you
Speaker 1: see something, you're gonna take it. Whether you are supposed
Speaker 1: to take it, is allowed or is legal to take
Speaker 1: it or not, you don't care. You have to satisfy
Speaker 1: those things in us we have no control over it.
Speaker 1: We have to sleep, we have to eat, we have
Speaker 1: to drink, we have to do things that we have
Speaker 1: no control over. And so when your body has put
Speaker 1: under so much pressure, it's going to react to it.
Speaker 1: Tell me about Sister Mary, mother in my heart, Oh
Speaker 1: my god, what can I not say about sister her
Speaker 1: birthdays two days from now. Um, my mother or sister
Speaker 1: Mary was and continues to be an amazing, amazing human being.
Speaker 1: I have never met anyone that exemplified unconditional love as
Speaker 1: she did. She was unconditional love. She is unconditional love.
Speaker 1: She taught me a lot. She fought for the women.
Speaker 1: She's the reason why we have this domestic violence conversation
Speaker 1: going on. She started it way back when. Um, She's
Speaker 1: always been fighting. She's always been fighting for people, especially women.
Speaker 1: She's like when it's not right, She faced anyone and
Speaker 1: just tell them. And you had to listen to her
Speaker 1: because she comes from a place. He came from her
Speaker 1: place that you felt this love, you felt this truth,
Speaker 1: You felt her and you knew that she was in line.
Speaker 1: You knew what you're saying is true, and you're just like,
Speaker 1: how could you tell this? None? No, all right. So
Speaker 1: she helped me get out of prison. She helped me
Speaker 1: become the donna that I am right now, the activist,
Speaker 1: the person that speaks out even more and just tells
Speaker 1: the story and tells the story of women and just
Speaker 1: tells about the conditions and stuff because it's important, and
Speaker 1: she really reinforced how important it is for us as
Speaker 1: people to stop hurting people, for us as people to
Speaker 1: love people at least respect to people, no matter color,
Speaker 1: no matter religion, no matter your sex, sexual preference, doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: That's who sister Mary continues to be. Yeah, she sounds
Speaker 1: like a just a beautiful woman and obviously was a
Speaker 1: hugely influential figure to you and a lot of others
Speaker 1: as you were leaving jail, which you eventually did. Um,
Speaker 1: you say you shared a message with with the women,
Speaker 1: and I'll just I'll just read it here because I
Speaker 1: think it's it's beautiful you say that. Um, I share
Speaker 1: with them the most important understanding I've developed during my
Speaker 1: time here, that we can connect deeply with humanity if
Speaker 1: we look through the eyes of love and compassion. We
Speaker 1: have to treat each other with constant love, both here
Speaker 1: and out in the world. We understood it, We kind
Speaker 1: of knew I think that. The more, Um, I won't
Speaker 1: say the more, I just know that a lot of
Speaker 1: the women there understood that they might not have known
Speaker 1: how to do it, you know what it would look like.
Speaker 1: What knew that that was it, and we just wanted
Speaker 1: the world to know that, and so some of us
Speaker 1: are doing that. We're telling the world. I stand up
Speaker 1: until the world. I get death threats because of it.
Speaker 1: I get a lot of things because of it. I've
Speaker 1: got all these so I've got a Wikipedia page that
Speaker 1: was created by somebody I don't even know whom. I
Speaker 1: mean all these things, but I continue to stand in
Speaker 1: my truth and stand in that truth that we have
Speaker 1: to come to this place where we love each other
Speaker 1: we get our humanity back, because if we don't, we're
Speaker 1: gonna definitely feed that bad like that bad wolf is
Speaker 1: getting bigger and bigger every every second of every day.
Speaker 1: And we can't. We can't. We can't do that. We
Speaker 1: cannot do that. That's not who that's not how we
Speaker 1: were we created and love. How could we not look
Speaker 1: at the beauty that's around us this world? Like who
Speaker 1: could imagine doing this? I hadn't have a clue how
Speaker 1: to do anything like this. I mean, this comes, but this,
Speaker 1: this is love, This is beauty all around us, that
Speaker 1: we just recognize it and really understand it, well, I
Speaker 1: think that is a beautiful place to end it too.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, Donna for for spending the time
Speaker 1: with this, sharing your story, for the work that you
Speaker 1: do in the world, and and it's just so inspiring
Speaker 1: and like I said, it's it's a real honor to
Speaker 1: have you on. Thank you so much. It was my pleasure.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I really appreciate it. And make sure to
Speaker 1: get a little piece of light. That's right. We'll have
Speaker 1: links to your book in the show notes for sure,
Speaker 1: as well as your website and on your website. You
Speaker 1: have a foundation that people can support, and we'll have
Speaker 1: we'll have links to that for all our listeners. Thank
Speaker 1: you so much again, Thank you, Donna. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1: So you have a great one you too. Okay, if
Speaker 1: what you just heard was helpful to you, please consider
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